Page 4 of Second Chances
“Oh, very precious, I think,” she said, her eyes twinkling at him and revealing rather attractive fine laugh lines at their outer corners. “And, yes, difficult, I can imagine, to the people who are responsible for her upbringing. I found her a delight.”
“It is remarkably decent of you to say so,” he said. “Had you been expecting to reach your destination today?”
“I had,” she said, looking ruefully toward the windows. “It is not going to happen, however, and my hope is now fixed upon tomorrow. One day’s delay is tedious. Another would be severely annoying.”
“And a great deal more delay, as was the case for Robinson Crusoe,” he said, “would be plain stupid—in my daughter’s opinion, anyway.”
She laughed. “I must confess,” she said, “that it was never my favorite book.”
“Or mine, though it is utter heresy to say so of an acknowledged classic.” He laughed with her. “But I believe it was my saying so that persuaded Georgette to choose it as one of her traveling books.”
“That is perfectly understandable,” she said. “You are on a long journey?”
“We have been on the road for three days,” he said. “This was to have been the last. But someone important—I cannot for the life of me remember who—once said that the only thing we can confidently expect of life is the unexpected. I have lived long enough to know that he was quite right. Or perhaps it was a she. It is foolish of us ever to expect that life will proceed according to our plans and expectations. Miss Thompson, I realize that I have bespoken the only private parlor this inn boasts. I suspect the dining room will be filled later. My children will be eating their dinner early. I would prefer to dine later especially if I can prevail upon you to join me. Perhaps it is impertinent of me to ask when we are strangers, but the circumstances are unusual.”
She hesitated visibly. It was not at all the thing, of course, for a single lady to dine alone with a single gentleman. But the circumstances were indeed beyond the ordinary, and he could almost see her weighing that fact against the alternative, which was to dine alone in a small and potentially crowded dining room.
“After having tea with your daughter,” she said at last, “I do believe I would find it quite flat to dine alone, Mr. Benning. Thank you. I will join you. At what time?”
“Eight o' clock?” he suggested. “The children will be ready for bed by then.”
“Eight o' clock it will be,” she said.
He bowed and returned upstairs. He must take Georgette to his room and do something with her for a while-play chess, perhaps. He had a traveling set in his bag, and she was getting good enough at it that he was beginning to enjoy their games. He had never simply allowed her to win. She would know and would scold him. But in the foreseeable future she might win without any help at all.
I found her a delight, Miss Thompson had said, and she had seemed to mean it. He had not come across many adults who shared her opinion, though a number of people were polite and pretended to be charmed by her. Miss Everly was one such person. She smiled whenever she encountered his daughter, and called her a sweet child—an inappropriate description if ever there was one. Through part of the London Season that had recently ended he had considered Miss Everly as a possible candidate for his second wife, though he had never taken the step of actually courting her. It was her mother who had suggested a boarding school for the child she always referred to as dear Georgette.
He opened the door of the children’s room quietly. Robert was still asleep. Georgette was perched on the side of his bed, patting his back through the bedcovers. Michael was always touched by the tender devotion with which she treated the sibling who was as different from herself as it was possible to be. His guess was that she was trying to make up for the fact that Robert had no mother. Though she did not either, did she?
She would have quite an adventure to recount to her mother and sisters when she arrived at Lindsey Hall, Eleanor thought as she changed into her gray silk with the white lace collar and sat for Alma to brush out her hair and coil it into a more elegant knot than usual high at the back of her head. She would not after all arrive tomorrow all grumbles about the storm and the tedious night she had been forced to spend on the road. Instead she would make much of describing her tea with the large platter of dainties worthy of the finest pastry cook and Georgette Benning for company. And she would make a riveting story of her invitation to dine tête-à-tête with the child’s handsome and charming papa in his private parlor.
She hesitated before reaching into her bag for the velvet box that held her brooch, which Alma proceeded to pin between the lapels of her collar. It was her one valuable piece of jewelry, a cluster of pearls given her by Christine and Wulfric for her birthday two years ago. She did have another precious piece, but only she ever saw the diamond betrothal ring she had worn on a chain about her neck ever since she had removed it from her finger after Gregory’s death at the Battle of Talavera—oh, a long time ago when she was young and full of dreams of endless love and happily-ever-after.
She hoped the brooch was not too elaborate for the occasion, though the thought amused her. Even if she had rings and bracelets and earrings to match, she would still look the prim, middle-aged spinster schoolteacher she was. The invitation to dine was merely the courtesy of a gentleman who wished to repay her for entertaining his daughter this afternoon. Or perhaps he felt that dining with her really was preferable to dining alone or eating early with his children. Whatever the reason, she was thankful to him. The inn was indeed full and the dining room would be crowded. She would be self-conscious sitting alone at a table there. She had never before stayed on her own at an inn.
She sent Alma off to her own dinner in the kitchen and went downstairs, smiling inwardly at the flutter of nervousness she was feeling, as though she were on her way to keep a romantic tryst. Thank heaven no one could read her thoughts. The innkeeper was hovering at the bottom of the stairs, and it was obvious he had been waiting for her. He bowed, led the way to the private parlor, tapped on the door, and opened it.
“Miss Thompson, your lordship,” he announced.
Your lordship? The gentleman was not simply Mr. Benning, then? He was not alone, either. The children were with him, Georgette all flushed and eager as she jumped to her feet, the little boy clearly alarmed as he scrambled up from his chair to press against her side and clutch one of her puffed sleeves, one eye hidden behind it. He did indeed look younger than his five years. He was a thin-faced, mop-haired, big-eyed child—the hair very blond, the eyes dark brown—and purely adorable. The remains of a meal were spread on the table.
“Oh,” Eleanor said, “am I early?”
“You are not,” the gentleman assured her, getting to his feet and making her an elegant bow. “We are late. Bedtime is never actually bedtime in our house or wherever we happen to be. It is always half an hour or so later. My children are experts at delaying the inevitable. True, Georgette?”
“But it was not me this time, Papa,” she protested. “Robbie wanted to have a look at Miss Thompson. He had only the merest peep when we arrived here.”
The little boy’s second eye disappeared behind her sleeve as though to give the lie to her words, but it reappeared almost instantly and gazed unblinkingly upon Eleanor.
“My son and heir, Robert Benning,” his father said. “Miss Thompson, Robert. Now would be a good time to make your bow.”
The eye disappeared again and his father sighed.
“He is shy,” Georgette explained. “There is nothing wrong with shyness, is there, Miss Thompson? If there were no quiet people in the world, there would be no one to listen to those who have not a shy bone in their bodies. Like me. It takes all sorts to make a world, do you not think?”
“I do indeed,” Eleanor said. “I am very pleased to make your acquaintance, Robert, and I shall assume that in your mind you have bowed to me. Are we not fortunate that the storm is over and seems to have no intention of returning? We must hope for sunshine tomorrow morning to dry the roads.”
The child peeped again.
